


Is This Finally Getting Somewhere?

by fandomfix



Series: you'll make your real friends and set yourselves apart [14]
Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hogwarts, Awesome Phasma, Feelings, Fluff and Angst, Friendship, Gen, Light Angst, M/M, Pre-Slash, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-19
Updated: 2017-05-19
Packaged: 2018-11-02 12:46:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10944795
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fandomfix/pseuds/fandomfix
Summary: Phasma just wants her friends to be happy. She wishes they wouldn't be suchboysabout the whole thing.





	Is This Finally Getting Somewhere?

**Author's Note:**

> This installment is a tiny bit different from the others, in that it's two connected vignettes instead of one overarching plot. But it's IMPORTANT so don't skip it!

Phasma is reaching the end of her rope.

Ok, that’s not true. She’ll be patient for a little while longer. But _Merlin_ would she like it if the boys would move it along.

Back in January, when she was pretty sure the feelings were new, it was fine. They’re boys, after all. It was going to take them a while to figure themselves out and get it together—and then _get together._

But it’s the beginning of May now. She does not look forward to the summer if she has to deal with her ridiculous best friends pining.

She has limits. She might end up hanging out with Mitaka and ignoring both of them if that happens. And that wouldn’t be anywhere near as fun.

Right now she’s in the library. Exams are coming soon and all the professors have been pushing harder and harder. She has a table all to herself and that’s the way she likes it. No one around to bother her. No one huffing about their school work across from her. Just her and the notes that are eating her life. Who thought magic involved so much _theory._

It’s with a sense of déjà vu that she hears the body collapse into the seat across from her. She looks up through her bangs and sees Kylo with his fingers clenched in his hair.

“Exams getting to you already, Ky?” She sets her quill aside, somehow knowing that isn’t what’s brought him here. After all, he isn’t carrying any of his books. And knows better than to bother her.

Kylo doesn’t seem to even hear her question. “Phas, can I ask you something?”

The eyebrow lifts on her forehead and she focuses on him.

“Sure. What can I do for you?”

“Have you ever thought you knew something, and then it seems like you were wrong? But then like…it made you figure some stuff about _yourself_ out, and now you don’t know how to continue?”

Phasma stares at him. She’s sure that was supposed to mean something. She’s sure somehow it’s connected to Hux.

This is what she’s talking about. The vague questions about the other when they’re not around. The _in no way subtle_ way they try to do things together, or do things for each other.

She has no problem with being the third wheel. She knows they’d fall apart without her. Honestly, she left them alone for twenty minutes on Kylo’s birthday and somehow they’d become even more awkward around each other. She hadn’t thought that was possible.

She just wishes the awkwardness was leading to something.

She sighs, pursing her lips and reaching across the table. Kylo takes her hand in a tentative grip.

“You _have_ to give me some details here, Kylo. That sentence only made sense in your head.”

Kylo stares down at their joined hands, huffing out a small laugh. He squeezes her fingers and she returns the gesture, never moving her eyes.

“If I tell you something, can you promise not to talk about it to anyone else. Even Hux?”

Phasma has to control the smile that forms on her face.

“If you need me to keep a secret, you know I can.”

He nods, looking at her through his curtain of hair. To an outside observer, the tableau before them would look intimate. Luckily for Kylo and Phasma, the library emptied as quickly as it always does when Kylo entered.

“So, um. I—“ Kylo runs his empty hand through his hair. He sighs in frustration, blowing air up to his bangs. Phasma snickers, but squeezes his hand again to encourage him.

“I like Hux. A lot. Like, as more than a friend. Like, I love you and this is great, but if it was Hux holding my hand right now I’d be thinking about kissing him. So like...definitely not as a friend.”

If Phasma could move outside her body right now, she would run screaming through the halls. She would go find Mitaka and screech incomprehensibly at him. She would go to dueling club and punch everyone on the shoulder in jubilation. She would jump across this table and hug the life out of Kylo until he lost all his breath.

Of course she can’t do that. And also, that would be the wrong reaction to have. After all, she might be the anxious observer, but they’re the actual players. To Kylo, this was happening in real time and terrifying. He couldn’t see the end result so clearly as Phasma.

She dropped his hand, but only long enough to walk around the table and sit next to him. Then she pulled him in, bringing his head to rest on her shoulder. Petting his hair, she stared at the top of his head.

“And does he know?”

She sees the stress in his face as he shakes his head.

“And it doesn’t matter.” He says quietly. “It doesn’t, cause we’re friends first and I know that’s more important. I’m not just trying to get to the next thing with him, because our friendship matters more.”

“But it’s hard when you think about kissing your friend constantly. I can see that.”

Kylo laughs, moving his head enough to catch her eyes.

“That’s not the most frustrating part though. Cause I could be happy with being friends, even with the kissing thing. I honestly could.” He sits up, but doesn’t shake off her hand. “What’s hard is that…I thought he might feel the same.”

Phasma frowns, cause she was pretty sure Hux did. But Kylo wasn’t the type to believe their interest was unrequited without any evidence.

“Wait…did he reject you? I thought you said he didn’t know?”

Kylo looks down to his lap, fiddling with his hands.

“He doesn’t. But something happened back at my birthday. I thought he was going to kiss me. But he didn’t, and he acted like nothing had happened, but Phasma. I’m…I’m pretty sure he was going to. And I wanted him to. And now I don’t know if it was wishful thinking. I don’t want to mess everything up if I was imagining it, but I want to tell him.”

The look in his eyes grows fierce. “You are my best friends and I tell you everything. I’ve been keeping this huge thing from you guys and I hated it. I realized I want you both to know. But what if I tell him and he never speaks to me again?”

Phasma is quiet for a minute. She’d known something happened back in April. But then everything with the _Prophet_ happened. She’d been more focused on helping Hux through that. She wasn’t worrying too much about romance drama.

“Ky,” she takes his hands once more, leaning in so that he has to look her right in the eye. “You can’t let this eat at you. You say you’re ok with being friends, so you’ve got a decision to make. You can either say nothing, and let it boil inside you until you burst like a game of exploding snap. _Or_ you tell him.”

His eyes widen, but she keeps talking before he can say more. “Cause I don’t think he’ll react as badly as you think he will. You’re his best friend too. And anyway, if he does try to cut you out of his life, I’ll beat him up.”

They smile at each other and Kylo leans forward to rest their foreheads together. They both close their eyes and sigh.

*

It turns out that the conversation in the library was good for both of them. Kylo seems less unsure about the direction he wants to go in (although he still hasn’t made a move). Phasma is much less worried about his ability to recognize and deal with his own feelings.

Of course, he was always the one she worried less about.

It’s been a couple weeks since their conversation, and she’s with Hux in the common room. Kylo will be meeting up with them later, but she wanted to spend a bit of time just the two of them. Ever since the news dropped about Hux’s mom, he’s been even more withdrawn. Phasma doesn’t want a repeat of first year, when it took her the entire year to get him comfortable in his own skin.

He’s sprawled out on the couch with Millie curled up in the space where his lap would be. Phasma is beside him, his feet in her lap. It’s a common occurrence when they’re together.

No one else is here right now, which isn’t surprising. The Slytherin common room can be a bit too dungeony for even the most seasoned of residents. No one spends time in here until late in to the evening.

They’ve been sitting in silence a bit too long though, and Phasma’s patience is waning.

“How are you, darling? You’re very quiet.”

Hux glances at her, as if he’d forgotten she was even there. He doesn’t lift his head from its position on the couch.

“What do you expect?” He asks after a long pause. “I’ve had a lot on my mind.”

Phasma frowns, fighting to control her temper. She knows she has no right to get impatient with him right now. Hux can be moody at the best of times, and it’s been a rough month. He doesn’t need her getting snappish with him on top of everything.

“I know, Hux. But you won’t talk to me about any of the things that are bothering you, so I worry. You know I worry. If I didn’t worry, you would gotten yourself killed before you reached your teens.”

Hux quirks his lips, not a full smile but definitely more emotion than he’d shown a few minutes ago.

“I know.” He whispers, making eye contact with Phasma for the first time since they came in here.

“So talk to me,” she says, hoping the exasperation isn’t completely obvious in her voice. “I know you don’t want to talk about all the family drama, but I’m here to listen. And if there’s anything else bothering you too. Don’t think I didn’t notice how strange you were acting even before the _Prophet_.”

This is a gamble. She will never betray Kylo’s secret, but she also knows she’s right. Kylo wasn’t the only one acting odd and now that she knows what happened, she wants to hear Hux’s side. She wants to know if Kylo was right about it having been a kiss.

Plus if Hux won’t talk to her, he won’t talk to anyone, and then he’ll stew on it and make everyone’s lives horrific.

He’s not saying anything, but she can tell he’s thinking. Can tell that he has something to say and isn’t sure how to go about it. It takes everything in her to keep her mouth shut.

“Phasma…” Hux trails off. His fingers tangle in Millie’s hair and he bites his lip. “If I tell you something, can you promise not to make it weird.”

“I’m offended. When have I ever made anything weird. I am the least weird of all two of your friends.”

He rolls his eyes and smiles, but doesn’t bother trying to disagree with her.

“So, before everything happened with my…my father. Do you remember Kylo’s birthday?”

She smiles softly, ignoring the voice in her head that shouts _FINALLY_.

“Of course I remember his birthday. I helped you mastermind the whole thing, if you’ll recall.”

He nods, finally sitting up. Millie jumps off the couch but he doesn’t even seem to notice. He crosses his arms and grips at his sleeves.

“You know how you left before us? Well, I did something dumb.”

She raises her eyebrow. It seems now that he’s started, Hux is going to keep talking.

“We were up there and were stargazing, and it was fun. And then I was looking at him in the dark, and I started thinking about how wonderful he is. And how much I’ve been starting to like him over the past few months, which I realize is news to you. And I…I almost kissed him.”

He looks at her, expecting surprise, but even if she didn’t already know she couldn’t have mustered any up. Instead, she keeps her face set in an understanding frown.

“And he pushed you away?” She asks, trying to lead him along. She _needs_ to know why he didn’t do it. She can’t help them if she doesn’t know what went wrong.

“No,” he shakes his head adamantly. “He didn’t even realize what was happening, it was so dark up there. We got interrupted and he left and…I realized that he wouldn’t want me to kiss him. I thought I felt something up there, but I was wrong cause there’s no way he’d like me that way. And he’s such a good friend for supporting me during all this family nonsense. If he knew how much I wanted to kiss him _all the time_ he’d never forgive me."

Phasma slid across the couch so they could sit side by side. They leaned their heads back and turned to look at each other.

“Darling,” she said, keeping her voice as gentle as possible. “It’s Kylo. He has a scar on his face because of you and it only made you better friends. Why do you think that you admitting to liking him is gonna be the thing that makes him run for the hills?”

“Why would you bring that up? I _still_ hate myself for that.” Hux said, squeezing his eyes closed.

“My _point_ ,” she continued, shoving him with her shoulder, “is that we’re stuck with him. I don’t think there’s anything either of us could do that would make him leave. He’s told you that he’s not going anywhere. If you don’t feel comfortable telling him, don’t do it. But if the only thing holding you back is the belief that he’d abandon you?” She trailed off. Hux was staring at her intently.

“Not everyone is your dad, Hux. Me and Kylo? We’re here to stay. Even if you abandoned it all and moved to the muggle world, we’d follow you. Don’t convince yourself that Kylo wouldn’t still want you, when he’s never done anything to imply otherwise.”

They stared at each other in silence. Phasma couldn’t help but think this was the second time in as many weeks that she’d been in a position that would seem strange to others. It caused a small smile to form on her lips, one that Hux mirrored.

“So, what should I do?” He whispered.

Phasma shrugged her shoulders. There were so many answers to that. So many ways she could manipulate this to get them together. But she’d made herself a promise back in January. Even if she had been getting impatient in recent weeks, she wouldn’t interfere. Now that she knew what was happening, it seemed less frustrating.

Besides, the two of them deserved a little bit longer to figure this out on their own.

“Do what feels right.” She let quiet fill the room for a moment before adding, “and make sure to tell me what happens. Need to know if I have to ditch Ky as a friend.”

The laugh that pulled out of Hux was worth all the annoying pining.

**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi on [our ](http://fandomfix8.tumblr.com) [tumblrs](http://obsessions-and-dreams.tumblr.com)!


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